Aika, definitely. She's one of the most likeable characters of her archetype that I know. Fina is just...dry. Cupil is adorable, though.

And yeah, there have been rumors of a HD re-release of Skies for about 6 months now, since they put the name back in for copyright. There hasn't been any updates as far as I know, but oh man, I want it badly.

The only things RG has on SoA is some decent weapon / item / skill crafting systems and action-y combat (which might not even be as solid as SoA's, which is turn-based but often excellent). SoA has WAY better environments (especially its awesome world map), characters, story, and audio. Both games have some pretty good side quests and a cartoon aesthetic hat holds up.

Yeah, I really enjoy both games (I play layer Rogue Galaxy last year and liked it just fine; I played SoA for the first time in high school, at least 10 years ago), but Skies of Arcadia is better.

Rogue Galaxy was one of those rare games I played that I knew I didn't and wouldn't like in the first ten minutes. I played it for a few hours, but the opinion didn't change. I got this with Dragon Quest games too.

Rogue galaxy isn't a bad game at all, honestly, just forgettable. Honestly, I liked the playthrough I did for it, and one day I may go back for a second run. Skies is just a vastly better game, in every aspect. Arguably some of the best battle music in an rpg, and the sidequests are a plenty. You'll be at the game for a good long time.

Yeah, I really enjoyed Rogue Galaxy's concept and graphics. It's just that like all Level 5 games, it had way too much filler and fell apart at the end. And the combat was a fun, if fluffy, action RPG. It was a solid 7-ish game for me, whereas SoA would be a 9.995 game for me. It's probably my favorite RPG on the Dreamcast.

Skies of Arcadia's only real flaw is the battle system. Near the end of the game, battles take forever.

Ship battles or on foot?Non-ship battles are broken and easy as crap after getting Prophecy and maybe Blue Rogues.Never got much into Rogue Galaxy but it has a fun battle sytstem though I have a soft spot for Dark Cloud's battles.edit: gotta love all that SOA influence in that youtube link in comments and that avatar.

I really liked Skies of Arcadia, but the encounter rate was excessive on the world map, even though it was absolutely fine in the dungeons. It took some of the shine off the fun of exploration when you were getting into the same battles over and over again. I haven't played the Gamecube version, apparently the encounter rate is lower, but from what I've heard the soundtrack wasn't converted perfectly, the Dreamcast sounds better.

I'd have no problem with random encounters in RPGs if only they followed Panzer Dragoon Saga's example - once you've outleveled an area encounters start to disappear completely, instead of wasting your time with pointlessly easy battles.